MP: Vaswani’s close associates come under I-T scanner

After conducting search at business and residential premises of BJP leader Sushil Vaswani and his relatives in Bhopal, the income tax department now launched a probe against his close business associates.

After conducting search at business and residential premises of BJP leader Sushil Vaswani and his relatives in Bhopal, the income tax department now launched a probe against his close business associates.

I-T sleuths on Tuesday and Wednesday conducted surveys at residential and business premises of a cloth merchant in the city’s Bairagarh area and a contractor in Lalghati area.

The cloth merchant is the siblings of one of directors of the Mahanagar Nagrik Sahkari Bank founded by Vaswani in 1992 while the contractor is close to the Vaswani family.

The cloth merchant and contractor also have accounts in the urban cooperative bank headed by Vaswani’s wife Kiran.

The investigations led taxmen to several incriminating documents pertaining to suspected tax evasion and allowing parking of old ₹500 and ₹1,000 rupee bills since announcement of demonetisation in their businesses, an official with the I-T department said on Wednesday.

Besides, a search at a jewellery showroom in Madhya Pradesh’s Narsinghpur town is continuing for the second day on Wednesday, the official said.

In Chhattisgarh’s Bemetara town, cash totaling ₹60 lakh, including over ₹3 lakh in new 500 and 2000 denomination banknotes, were seized during a survey by the I-T department at premises of a medical store owner on Tuesday.